A Fugitive Arc is usually particularly tense because any moment can turn into a conflict, and when the entire world is out to get them the odds are not in their favor. Additionally, there's the fact that The Hero usually doesn't want to hurt his pursuers who are simply pursuing someone they believe to be a criminal.

Buso Renkin: After Kazuki discovers that he has a black Kakugane and is turning into a Walking Wasteland, the third arc of the series sees him, Tokiko, and Gota are hunted by their former allies from the Alchemist Army.

Fractale begins with Phryne fleeing from Enri, and the rest of Lost Millennium. But she's fleeing from The Temple, as well. Both factions are after her and Nessa for their own agendas. The Temple needs her to merge with Nessa, in order to reboot the Fractale System. For Lost Millennium, she's the key to destroying it.

The Rising of the Shield Hero has this happen to Naofumi's party due to a conspiracy by the Three Heroes Church to kill Melty and usurp the throne. He almost convinces the other Heroes that he's innocent, only for Malty to create a lie about Naofumi brainwashing his party.

A Certain Magical Index: The final volume of the Magic God Othinus arc has Touma ally with Othinus, an international terrorist and former Physical God. Their goal is to reach the spring in Denmark where Othinus first gained her power, so that she can give up her power and then surrender. For the duration of the volume, the entire world is out to get them, including the former allies of both Touma and Othinus. Played with, in that many of Touma's allies deliberately let him through.

In an old Legion of Super-Heroes story, the Legion is outlawed following an evil scheme by Universo to take over the government of Earth. With the mightiest members of the Legion having been shipped off to a prison planet, the others of the Legion have to stay one step ahead of the law while trying to break their buddies out and get to the bottom of the whole mess.

The Batman storyline Bruce Wayne: Fugitive, which had the Bat-family try to find out if Bruce really did kill someone or if it was all planted.

In "Dead End Kids", the Runaways are on the run from SHIELD after tearing up one of its secret prisons during the Marvel Civil War. Since they don't trust any of the superheroes, they turn to the Kingpin, except that they manage to piss him off, too, resulting in him sending a whole squad of ninjas after their asses. In desperation, they activate a device that propels them back in time to 1907. By the time they find a way to return to the present, the Secret Invasion is well underway, so nobody's looking for them anymore.

The "End Game" storyline of Archie Comics' Sonic the Hedgehog had Sonic being framed for Princess Sally's apparent murder and having to go on the run. The cover of one issue even crossed out "Hedgehog" and replaced it with "Fugitive".

Fan Works

In Loved and Lost, right after Prince Jewelius has helped Twilight Sparkle stop the Changeling invasion, he seizes Equestria's throne by tricking everypony to blame the princesses as well as Twilight's brother and friends for the invasion's consequences. Exiled and sentenced to slavery, the disgraced heroes soon attempt to clear their names and earn their lives back, discovering in the process that Jewelius himself caused the Changelings to attack Canterlot before double-crossing them.

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Film

In The Simpsons Movie, the titular family is on the run from the law because they escaped from the now environmentally-unsound city of Springfield.

Given the litany of minor crimes that he commits in order to pursue/protect his treasure, Ben Gates finds himself having to avoid lawmen in both National Treasure films.

When the clairvoyant Pre-Cogs in Minority Report indicate that Chief Investigator John Anderton will murder someone in the next 36 hours, Anderton goes on the lam, hoping to glean an important clue from the strongest Pre-Cog, whose visions often include significant details that the two other clairvoyants miss and clear his name.

Veteran CIA agent Evelyn Salt is named as a mole by a captured Cold War derelict. She escapes house arrest, then reconnects with her Soviet spy comrades. However, when Salt learns that her superiors are planning a rogue operation that will trigger a nuclear war, she works feverishly to undo their plans. This makes Evelyn Salt kill-on-sight by American and Soviet forces.

Invoked with Burt Reynolds' character Bandit in Smokey and the Bandit, since Bandit takes the point to bait highway patrolmen to chase him, clearing the way for Cletus and his tractor-trailer.

When a routine covert mission Goes Horribly Wrong in Mission: Impossible, agent Ethan Hunt is labeled a rogue agent. Hunt must band together other decommissioned agents to expose the true double agent, thereby clearing his name.

When NSA chief Thomas Reynolds is caught on tape murdering Congressman Hammersley in Enemy of the State, the tape gets passed surreptitiously to attorney Robert Dean. Dean becomes target of a massive manhunt by the NSA.

This trope drives the first Rambo film First Blood, when top soldier John Rambo runs afoul of local law enforcement, who discover the hard way that they are horribly outclassed.

In the second half of Thor: The Dark World, Thor and company intentionally commit treason by trying to take the Aether out of Asgard and breaking Loki out of prison. This leads to most of Thor's friends holding off (and eventually captured by) the soldiers that tried to stop them.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier has Cap and Black Widow going on the run from S.H.I.E.L.D. for a good part of the movie. Then it turns out they're actually on the run from HYDRA forces that have infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D.

It happens again in the third film, Captain America: Civil War, where the Avengers are torn in half by differing opinions on the Sokovian Accords, with one half of the team trying to hunt the others. Their criminal status will last for most of Phase 3, giving a handwave to why the team can't be around to face any new threats, at least until Avengers: Infinity War.

Antman And The Wasp: Because of his actions in Civil War Scott Lang goes on house arrest, and Hank Pym and Hope van Dyne on the run from the FBI. However, because he had an encounter with Janet van Dyne while in the quantum realm, Scott finds himself working with Hank and Hope again while fooling the FBI into thinking that hes still in his house.

In Deryni Checkmate, Duncan rescues Morgan from the rebel Warin deGrey and his forces, but during the battle a fire starts that burns down the shrine where Morgan was taken captive. Morgan and Duncan flee, and are soon excommunicated by the Church hierarchy. Kelson ignores the decree of anathema to consult Morgan on war preparations against a coming Torenthi invasion, and Duncan ignores his suspension and the likely excommunication to celebrate a Mass (the funeral mass for his brother and Morgan's sister). In High Deryni, after learning of the schism in the Curia, Morgan and Duncan slip into Dhassa to meet with Cardiel and his faction and get the ban lifted.

This happens to Harry Dresden in The Dresden Files pretty often (usually because he has to keep secrets from the police, but other times he's actually framed). In Turn Coat, Harry harbors a wanted fugitive from the White Council itself for the entire novel.

Happens to John Taylor in The Bride Wore Black Leather. Although there isn't much actual law in the Nightside, he still has to flee mob vengeance and his friends Razor Eddie, Dead Boy and the Oblivion brothers.

Much of The Leonard Regime is spent with the main characters being wanted. This ultimately escalates into all-out war as the characters gain followers.

Live Action TV

Luther had the title character forced to go on the run towards the end of the first series after he's framed for killing his estranged wife, Zoe.

Supernatural had an extended one of these, as the Winchesters are pursued by the FBI after a shapeshifter disguised as Dean commits a murder. Not helping their case are the facts that they are often around when people inexplicably do get killed, and they do commit a myriad of lesser crimes in the course of their investigations. The heat is eventually off when they manage to be declared legally dead.

Angel: At the end of Season 4, Jasmine has risen to power and has the majority of the LA's populace in her thrall. The Fang Gang are the only ones not under her thrall and thus need to avoid everyone affected by Jasmine while still find the means to defeat her.

Once, Descoine frames Steele for a hit-and-run death. Steele and Laura have to try to solve the case while avoiding a plainclothes cop named Jarvis.

In a later episode, Descoine calls the police claiming that Steele and Laura threatened to kill him at a particular place at noon; he himself promises them they will be dead by noon that same day, then leads them on a merry chase. The trio arrive at the designated spot, where the cop tries to arrest Laura and Steele; Laura and Steele disarm the cop and steal his police cruiser to get away and resume their pursuit of Descoine.

This was the central premise of Johnny Bago. Johnny is framed for killing The Don's son and goes on the lam.

This was going to be part of the plot of the Babylon 5-spinoff Crusade, if that show hadn't been cancelled in its first season. The plot would have seen the crew of the Excalibur becoming renegades as they tried to expose Earth Force's experiments with alien technology.

The A-Team is a group of commandos who were convicted of a crime they didn't commit. They escaped and became mercenaries who are still being hunted by the US Army, which frequently leads to Refuge in Audacity moments when they pull jobs right under the Army's nose.

On White Collar Neal is a Boxed Crook who helps the FBI in exchange for limited parole in New York City. From time to time he breaks parole and becomes a fugitive for a while until he can cut a new deal. Sometimes he is being framed but a few times he really was guilty.

On Farscape, the Leviathan Moya was a Peacekeeper prison ship that was commandeered by the prisoners, making them all (even Moya, who was a sentient Living Ship) fugitives from the Peacekeepers. D'Argo was wrongly convicted of murdering his wife; deposed Hynerian Dominar (emperor) Rygel XVI seemed to be simply "guilty" of being on the wrong side of prevailing politics 130 years ago when he was first imprisoned; Zhaan was actually guilty of murder (although done against a political usurper who'd sent her father to a labor camp as a political prisoner); and Aeryn became a defector from the Peacekeepers. Crichton, who'd encountered the Leviathan after jumping through a wormhole from Earth, was hunted at first for accidentally colliding with a Peacekeeper prowler upon exiting the wormhole and killing Commander Crais' brother, then later for the knowledge of wormholes he possessed. Chiana, who joined the crew later in the first season, was a fugitive from the Nebari who'd been sentenced to "mentalcleansing", a sort of brainwashing "re-education" method used on malcontents in her society.

From 1963 to 1969 this was an understated, but ever-present, background arc as the Doctor was depicted as being on the run from his own people for reasons not revealed until he is finally captured in the 1969 story "The War Games" and put on trial.

The first Cyberman serial of the revival has the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey join up with La Résistance against Cybus Industries.

The third series finale has Martha with a mostly (but not entirely) off-screen Fugitive Arc while she prepares for the final confrontation with Saxon.

Series 9 in 2015 ended on an open-ended fugitive arc, with the newly immortal Clara Oswald last seen on the run from the Time Lords.

The Doctor (to Clara): Run like hell because you'll always have to.

NewsRadio had a brief arc in which Jimmy James was accused of being notorious hijacker D.B. Cooper, and while he was on the run, his archrival Johnny Johnson took over his company.

Invoked with Bo and Luke Duke from The Dukes of Hazzard, because the Dukes are always at odds with county magnate Boss Hogg and his corrupt Sheriff Coltrane. Fortunately for the Dukes, the General Lee, a 1968 Dodge Charger, can outrun and outwit Hogg and Coltrane.

Near the end of season 2, Chuck and Sarah go on the run together when Beckman orders Chuck to be removed to a secure facility, and are subsequently hunted by Casey.

Once again, at the end of season 3, Chuck and his team are branded traitors after Shaw takes control of the CIA.

Happens several times during season 5, courtesy of Clyde Decker ( who is later revealed to be in league with Shaw).

On Bones, Brennan with the aid of her father goes on the run after Pelant frames her for murder.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer season five sees the gang fighting both a cult of murderous knights and a hell god. Toward the end of the season, Buffy decides the only reasonable thing to do is run.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: In the aftermath of the events of Captain America: The Winter Soldier the team finds themselves on the run from the United States government starting at the tail end of Season 1. About halfway through Season 3, however, they manage to strike up a backroom deal with the President — while SHIELD is still formally a rogue organization, they work with their replacement agency the ATCU to handle threats said agency can't.

Happens Once a Season on 24: At one point during each Jack will be wanted by the authorities and his fellow agents and chased for several episodes, either because someone has framed him or he has disobeyed protocol.

Leverage uses this trope twice, given that the main focus is a gang of thieves.

The second season finale has them on the run from the FBI after accidentally foiling an arms dealer plot when going after a corrupt mayor.

The fourth season finale has them hiding from the series' very first Villain of the Week Victor Dubenich, who isn't really law enforcement but has powerful security and blew their covers.

The second half of Heroes's third season is titled "Fugitives", with most of the main characters on the run from a government program led by Nathan Petrelli to capture and harness people with powers for military purposes.

Heroes's sequel series, Heroes Reborn (2015), has the Fugitive Arc as its entire premise as after Claire's revelation of the existence of powers, there was a huge backlash and anti-power sentiment which got even worse after a horrible bombing in Odessa. It was blamed on powers and Mohinder Suresh, forcing all the surviving specials who haven't been killed to go into hiding.

The flashfowards of Quantico has main character Alex Parrish going on the run after finding out she's been framed for the bombing of New York's central station.

First in the season three's mid-season 3-part finale, John and Carter go on the run with the head of HR trying to bring him into FBI custody with all of HR's forces on their backs hunting them down.

Again in the season finale, after Samaritan is successfully implemented and uploaded online. Team Machine ditch their old base of operations and their cover identities and run for an abandoned subway station.

Then again in season four finale. After narrowly evading capture and defeat, the team make an escape with Harold carrying what's left of the Machinein a briefcase while John and Root gun down Samaritan mooks.

The Blacklist: For the first half of Season 3, Elizabeth Keen is on the run from the FBI after the Cabal frames her as a Russian sleeper agent responsible for a series of terrorist actions (though her killing the Attorney General, a Cabal member himself, certainly doesn't help her case). This is resolved when Reddington gains leverage on the Cabal leadership, blackmailing them into scapegoating one of their members and pardoning Keen. And even then, Keene still gets kicked out of the Bureau.

Filipino cop drama FPJ's Ang Probinsyano had its eponymous protagonist Cardo Dalisay go through this ordeal in two rather long arcs that he has spent more time as a wanted criminal than as a law enforcer.

The first time was when he was framed as a drug lord by corrupt cops, with only his family and fellow honest cops believing his innocence. He spent the first part of this arc serving time in prison before escaping and under circumstances becoming an enforcer for a notorious kingpin in Cebu.

After the untimely death of his son, Cardo rejoins the Special Action Force in order to get justice, only to come under the care of the Pulang Araw (lit. "Red Sun"note No, not those Red Suns.), the very rebels he was tasked to hunt. He eventually joins these rebels, warming up to them, even up to warning them of an incoming assault by the Armed Forces, a battle of which only a scant few Pulang Araws survive. Cardo joins the survivors in trying to exact revenge on the man responsible, Renato Hipolito, a Pulang Araw turncoat and aspiring politician that sold them out for his ambitions. Hipolito turns this event around and makes it a variant of Engineered Public Confession in his favor, turning Cardo into one of the country's Most Wanted. The Pulang Araws' (later renamed "Vendetta" and joined by some of Cardo's trusted allies) ongoing conflict with Hipolito eventually escalates when Hipolito allies with the corrupt Vice-President Lucas Cabrera and even the President of the country himself, Oscar Hidalgo (who is not actually corrupt, but rather is an Unwitting Pawn tricked into believing Vendetta are truly enemies of the state). Having realised that he was being Used All Along and declared Legally Dead, Hidalgo went into exile with Vendetta as he has nothing to lose after the death of his family.

Music

Bob Marley's "I Shot The Sheriff": the protagonist is on the run for being accused of murdering sheriff John Brown, which he admits the did, though he had nothing to do with the murder of his deputy.

Once the Creature's evil minions start possessing the bodies of townsfolk, a mob of people will form in an attempt to defeat whatever's causing the problem. Unfortunately the Creature's minions will infiltrate the mob and convince them that the PCs are behind it all. The mob will start hunting the PCs and will kill them if possible.

If the PCs is forced to kill a possessed townsperson, either a mob will form to kill them (see above) or an arrest party of high level characters will be sent out to apprehend them.

The second book of Orpheus, Crusade of Ashes, focuses on the Player Characters becoming fugitives after the catastrophic events at the beginning of the book. Following up, the next book, Shades of Gray, gives them the potential to return to the good graces of the authorities, or continue working outside the law.

Champions adventure Deathstroke. After Deathstroke steals the isotopes, the PC superheroes can try to track them down. If they try to do so in their secret identities and fail their Deduction rolls, Federal agents will tell them to stop their investigation. If they continue, the Federal government will start pursuing and trying to capture them.

During a good part of Sonic the Comic  Online!! Sonic is seen as a criminal and a traitor by almost the entirety of Mobius due to being slandered by the media and then framed by a shapeshifting robot. Revealed to all being planned by Grimer, as revenge for Robotnik's insanity. By issue 275 Sonic finally clears his name

Video Games

In the first Pokémon Mystery Dungeon game, the main characters have to leave to find Ninetales to clear their name from Gengar's accusations that the main character is responsible for the rise in natural disasters.

In Deus Ex: Human Revolution, on your second visit to Hengsha, Belltower (a PMC who have a contract to serve as the police force) are pretty pissed off at you for what you did on your first visit. They shoot down your aircraft (and possibly kill Malik if you can't save her in time or just flee) and will attack on sight even if you don't enter areas they have closed off.

The middle of BioShock Infinite qualifies after your character is identified as "the False Shepherd" and thus an enemy of Columbia. Eventually the city succumbs to an Enemy Civil War so this stops coming into play, though you still have to fight enemies from both sides.

Most of Max Payne has the title character on the run from the cops after his partner Alex is murdered and Max is framed for it.

Mega Man Battle Network 6 has this in Judgeman's arc after the Judge Tree gets hacked. (though it's more of a case of EVERYONE is on the run from the law)

In Final Fantasy IX, Zidane and company are on the run from the kingdom of Alexandria after kidnapping/aiding in the escape of Princess Garnet.

The beginning of the Revelations path in Fire Emblem Fates has the Avatar and Azura on the run after being branded traitors to both warring kingdoms.

Star Wars: The Old Republic: The first few chapters of Knights of the Fallen Empire has the Outlander, along with an exiled Sith, a former Knight of Zakuul, the late Zakuulan emperor's estranged lover and HK-55, hiding out in the swamps of Zakuul trying to lay low until they manage to escape into uncontrolled space.

The third act of the Bounty Hunter storyline has the player's rep sheet being filled with enough fraudulent crimes to make them the Galaxy's Most Wanted, making them unhireable save for a particularly ruthless Sith Lord. Granted, the player is already a war criminal by that point, but the events basically pin them as (and force them to become) terrorists.

In the second half of Final Fantasy X, Yuna and her pilgrimage persecuted by most of Spira for murdering Maester Seymour. The heat was only temporarily lifted off of them when the leader of the Corrupt Church believed Yuna had finally obtained the means for the Final Summoning to defeat Sin, when in reality Yuna and her party defeated Yunalesca, the summoner who was supposed to grant the power of the Final Aeon.

The final arc of Criminal Case Season 4, Mysteries of the Past, has Concordia's newly inaugurated mayor taking a Knight Templar approach to fighting crime, and the Flying Squad (the player character's team) must work together with an underground resistance group to bring him down.

The Altered Present arc of Season 6 sees the T.I.M.E. team return to their home time period, only to learn that Time Travel has been outlawed, and they are now forced to go on the run, a situation that lasts to the rest of the season.

In the Mega Man X series, Zero is a Maverick Hunter who takes down dangerous criminal Mavericks. This gets reversed in the Mega Man Zero series where Zero joins a rebellion to protect innocent Reploids who are unfairly persecuted, getting labelled a Maverick himself in the process.

Roughly halfway through Ys Seven, the king of Altago gets murdered and protagonist Adol becomes the prime suspect. After surviving his execution (a Duel Boss where Adol is extremely ill-equipped), his friends bust him out and they have to spend the second half avoiding Altago's soldiers.

Western Animation

Justice League has this half-way through the "Starcrossed" arc, when the League is declared enemy combatants by the Thanagarian occupation force.

In the second season, Zuko and Iroh wind up fugitives of their native Fire Nation, so they go incognito in the Earth Kingdom.

The Gaang in the third season is traveling through the Fire Nation, concealing the fact that not only are they from the other nations, but also that Aang is even alive.

In Book 3 of The Legend of Korra, Korra and the heroes are declared enemies of the state by the Earth Kingdom after rescuing airbenders the Dai Li have been kidnapping. Zaofu is the only place in the Earth Kingdom that doesn't have it out for them.

SWAT Kats has the episode "A Bright And Shiny Future", wherein the evil Metallikats rule Megakat City. Chance and Razor are branded as outlaws, and must join a small but dedicated resistance force to overthrow Mac and Molly.

Experiment 626 escapes from a prison transport in Disney's Lilo & Stitch, and flees to Earth. At first, the Grand Councilor believes "we have to gas the planet," but Obstructive Bureaucrat Pleakley points out that Earth is home to mosquitoes, "which, may I remind you, are an endangered species." A clandestine extraction team is sent instead.

In the "Turtles in Space" storyline in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003), a teleporter accident sends the Turtles in the middle of an alien war between the Federation and the Triceratons. And they find themselves facing heat from both sides for protecting their new friend the Fugitoid, who is the only one who can help them return home.

In the Storm Hawks episode "Atmos' Most Wanted", the Storm Hawks discover that they've become wanted criminals and have to work to clear their names while evading their fellow Sky Knight squadrons. The crimes they're wanted for turn out to have been a series of Frame Ups by the Raptors wearing Paper Thin Disguises.

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